Welcome to the Pinball Archive!
All files of somewhat lasting interest and relevance to pinball are welcome
in the Pinball Archive; send new submissions by e-mail to "sigma@mcs.com".
Please send any additions/corrections/comments to me and/or the original
author(s).
The original FTP Archive is:
pinball.cc.cmu.edu (128.2.35.22): /pinball
Mirrors are:
ftp.mcs.com (192.160.127.87): /mcsnet.users/sigma/pinball
ftp.nl.net (193.78.240.15): /pub/games/pinball
ftp.funet.fi (128.214.248.6): /pub/doc/games/pinball
ftp.rahul.net is no longer affiliated with the Archive.
If you are in or near Europe or Scandinavia, you may find that the overseas
mirrors of the Archive provide faster response.
Please note: the ftp.mcs.com mirror does NOT carry the Binaries/ subtree,
due to its relatively large size. Also, none of the FTP sites carry HTML
files, in general.
Mirror sites will generally lag behind the original Archive no more than
one day.
If you did not retrieve this file through FTP and would like to know how to
use FTP, it's usually quite simple. A program called ftp or ncftp on your
system connects to the Archive and lets you list directories and retrieve
files interactively. The simplest way to reach the Archive without using
the Web is to type:
ftp pinball.cc.cmu.edu
You should be prompted for username. Specify:
anonymous
You should then be prompted for a password. Type in your e-mail address
(this will normally be invisible, so don't panic).
If you receive a welcome message from the host but are not prompted for
a username or password, type:
user anonymous
pass your-email-address
Once you have connected to the system in this manner, you can use the
commands "cd", "dir", and "get" to use the Archive. You should always
begin with:
cd /pinball
Once you're there, the best files to start with are Listing, Latest, and
README (this file, but it might have been updated). Rulesheets are under
Rules/ (cd Rules), but there's much more to the Archive. Look around, it's
free and plentiful. Retrieve a file you like with, for example:
get jurassic
You can go to the previous directory level with:
cd ..
Exit your FTP client with the command "quit".
The ncftp is an enhanced FTP which does the anonymous login part for you by
default.
If none of this does anything on your system, ask your local administrator
or guru if your system has FTP or Web access, and if so, how to use it to
reach the Archive. Many BBSes and subscriber accounts are on systems that
are not "live" on the Internet, which is a requirement to get these kinds
of access to work.
The simple mailserver provided for e-mail access to the Archive is now
defunct, as the account supporting it has expired. Please use FTPmail
(described below) instead. The mailserver may be recreated at some
future date if there is enough demand.
To access FTPmail, a somewhat more complex and general purpose mailserver,
send the message "help" to "ftpmail@decwrl.dec.com". Using FTPmail will
usually be quite slower than the parchive mailserver, although FTPmail
provides a few more features (split files, for example).
If you have a client (such as xmosaic) for accessing the World Wide Web,
you can reach a much better version of the Pinball Archive through the
following URL:
http://pinball.cc.cmu.edu/
An additional service related to the Archive is an automated mailing list
for the Latest file. Subscribers to this mailing list receive a one-way
mailing of the Latest file twice per week. This is a handy way to keep an
eye on updates to the Archive, without the trouble of logging in to check.
To subscribe to this mailing list, send a note to "sigma@mcs.com".
A complete listing of files with one-line descriptions is kept in the file
"Listing" in the pinball directory where you found this README file.
The Pinball Archive is organized into many subdirectories; this became
necessary as the archive grew larger and larger. However, there are still
no two files anywhere in the hierarchy which have the same name. Rules
sheets take precedence among files related to a particular machine.
This is done so that FTP users will not accidentally overwrite files in
their local directory as they retrieve files from different subdirectories.
Note that some files contain information that tends to "expire"; this
includes tournament and auction announcements and information about
prototype machines (called betas for our purposes). These files migrate to
the Old/ directory or are deleted entirely. Files in the Old/ directory
may not be listed in the Listing file.
The Quick/ subdirectory contains Quick Take files, which are quick overviews
of a particular pinball game. These should be useful for posterity, and for
quick reference. Quick Takes should usually include descriptions of a
game's playfield, cabinet, a summary of its rules and features and any
significant gimmicks or innovations, and miscellaneous notes about its
production, success as an earner, maintenance difficulties, etc. Quick
Takes are not really meant to just be summaries of Rules Sheets - there
should be additional interesting information or opinions about the machine.
Feel free to write a Quick Take for *any* pinball game and submit it to
the Pinball Archive. In fact, feel free to write any Rules Sheet that you
can't find in the Archive, or your own Tips file if you like.
Remember, file descriptions are now kept in the Listing file.
LEGAL NOTICE: Although most of the files in the Archive are public domain,
freely redistributable, or similarly marked, the Archive as a whole is
protected by (C) Copyright 1995 Kevin Martin and "pair, inc", to the extent
allowable by law. You may take any individual portion of the Archive and
treat it in accordance with its own legal disclaimers (contact the author if
there are none), but the overall structure of the Archive and the control
files associated with it (README, Latest, Listing, Stats*, directories,
cgi-bin, etc) are subject to copyright. You may not reproduce, redistribute,
or "mirror" the Archive as a whole without prior written permission (the
mirror sites listed above are granted this permission). The Archive manager
has no legal affiliation with any of the authors (with the obvious exception
of his own files), and his employer and previous employers have no
affiliation with or sponsorship of the Archive whatsoever.
The Archive and all of its resources and functions are financially provided
for solely by myself, and it isn't cheap. I'm merely asking that my work
not be stolen out from under me.
- - -
Kevin Martin
sigma@mcs.com
sigma+@cmu.edu